


Three Reasons, or Maybe Excuses

by Woldy



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: Character Study, Character of Color, F/F, Friendship, POV Character of Color, POV Female Character, Queer Themes, Wordcount: 100-1.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-10
Updated: 2010-01-10
Packaged: 2017-10-06 02:03:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/48509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woldy/pseuds/Woldy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three reasons why Parvati isn't allowed to fancy Lavender.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Reasons, or Maybe Excuses

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at a fanfic exploring some of the issues faced by women of colour and/or ethnic minorities in the UK. I've been hesitant about diving into this subject matter because I don't want to over-simplify things, but it also seems weird to me that so few authors explicitly address the intersections between sexuality, gender and ethnicity. Critical comments are welcome, but please be assured I don't wish to offend anyone – in particular, the comment about bisexual girls is intended a wry observation about common uses of the term rather than as an insult to anyone's self-identification.

The first reason Parvati's not allowed to fancy Lavender is because Lav is straight.

Straight as a broomstick, straight as a telegraph pole, straight, straight, straight. Lav is incredibly girly and while Parvati is fully aware that you can be both gay and girly, she's pretty sure that Lav isn't.

Lav spends more time and effort going after boys than anyone Parvati's ever met, enough time that some of the other Gryffindors clearly disapprove. It seems as though Lav values her romances over her NEWTs and while Parvati isn't criticising her for those choices it means that fancying Lav would be a lost hope, wouldn't it?

It took only a few weeks for Lav to go from murmuring saccharine endearments to Ron Weasley, to crying over him, to replacing him. It's clear that Lav is oriented – ridiculous word, we're not planets are we – towards guys, if not actually stuck on them.

All of which makes her incredibly unsuitable object for Parvati's affections even if it wasn't for the second reason Parvati's not allowed to fancy Lavender: because she's Indian.

That sounds like a bad reason but it's still important. Although her parents aren't close-minded, they seem to think that being gay is confined to white people. None of her family have ever met an Indian person who was gay and thinks that her parents' knowledge of gay people is pretty much restricted to Elton John, Martina Navratilova and the lesbian couple who run Birmingham Potions Supplies.

Which leads to the widespread impression that gay is something that Indians don't do. That's rubbish, Parvati is certain, but it's taken quite a lot of effort to convince herself and she's not sure she can convince her parents. And grandparents. And her aunts, uncles and all their friends, some of whom aren't nearly as liberal as her parents.

The third reason Parvati isn’t allowed to fancy Lavender is because that would make her a lesbian. Well, a lesbian or a bisexual, though the latter often seems to just mean that you make out with girls when you're drunk, and Parvati thinks that her complete lack of sexual interest in men takes her out of that group.

The problem with being a lesbian is that Parvati doesn't like labels. She's spent her whole life being Indian which can be trouble enough, especially when the Immigration people look at them suspiciously at International Floo terminals.

Being brown, male and under-forty means that her brother Paresh gets hassled all the time by Muggle police because apparently he fits the _profile_.

"That's what multiculturalism means, is it? They give us permission to be Indian on the condition we submit ourselves for demeaning searches," her dad complains.

"Give off dad, I know how to deal with it," mutters Paresh, shoving his hands deeper into his pockets.

Padma rolls her eyes and shoots Parvati the look that means 'it's the _because we're Indian_ talk, again', but Parvati is proud of her dad.

The talks are his way of arming them against the hassle from officials or bitchy comments from some of the people at Hogwarts. If things in Britain have got better and nobody throws stuff at her grandma or jeers at their neighbours' turbans any longer, then it's because her parents' generation changed things. In her dad's case, probably by giving regular _because we're Indian_ lectures to his workmates.

No, Parvati doesn't need to be labelled and categorised any further, so she can do without being a 'lesbian' thank you very much. She was briefly tempted by the idea of being 'queer' - which seems to mean that you think fixed identities are stupid - but there's an irony in labeling oneself as someone who doesn't like labels.

For now she's just going to be Parvati, who happens to be Indian. If Lav ever stops flirting with boys long enough to notice that Parvati looks at her a bit longer, a bit more often, a bit more intently than is normal for a straight friend…

Well, if Lavender ever notices her or perhaps even does something about it, then Parvati thinks they'll work something out.

**Author's Note:**

> The original version of this story misspelled Parvati's name, for which I apologize. My thanks to nupuroo for pointing this out.


End file.
